Now You Can Visit Jimi Hendrix's Home of His Own

Right, Hendrix in his flat at 23 Brook Street, on January 4, 1969. Courtesy of Barrie Wentzell Photography. Left, the exteriors of 23 and 25 Brook Street today. (Jimi’s joint is on the left.) Courtesy of Handel House Museum.

If, in 1968 or 1969, Jimi Hendrix had casually mentioned to some foxy lady, some cute little heartbreaker, that “I wanna take you home,” then the home he meant was probably the tiny four-room London flat at 23 Brook Street, in Mayfair, which he shared with his girlfriend Kathy Etchingham (who might well have turned away any unwelcome new female friends at the threshold). The apartment is barely a burning Stratocaster’s throw from Claridge’s. It was also not much farther, in Hendrix’s day, from the Marquee, the Speakeasy, and other clubs that he, figuratively if not always literally, lit up while he was in London. Not only that, but it’s also right next door to the house where a virtuoso of an earlier age, the great baroque composer George Frideric Handel, lived for 36 years. Hendrix, apparently, was tickled by the connection and strolled up to HMV on nearby Oxford Street to plunder the Handel section. Today Hendrix’s flat at No. 23 is used as offices by administrators of the Handel House Museum, at No. 25. For 12 days in September, however, the doors of Hendrix’s former pad will be thrown open to the public, to mark the 40th anniversary of his death. Starting today, Handel House will host an exhibition of Hendrixabilia and a series of talks on his musical legacy. But it is the chance to catch a glimpse of the only place Hendrix ever thought of as “a home of my own” that will have pilgrims beating a path to Brook Street.

Hendrix’s flat at 23 Brook Street will be open September 15–26. (Tickets can be purchased at seetickets.com/events.) The exhibition “Hendrix in Britain,” at Handel House Museum, 25 Brook Street, runs until November 7.